Worthlessness
by Nika Raven Celeste
Summary: Worthless. That was what magi always said when they have to describe one Waver Velvet. A first generation magus with nothing to speak of. However, what if Worthless was more than description? That Waver actually have one thing that either made him respectable Magus or Sealed? After all, this Waver is not exactly mere first generation of Magi.
1. Chapter 1

Me: *slamming head to nearby wall* I really love making my life difficult, aren't I? And here I think my Theory Conspiracy in my other FSN x DxD fic is crazy. This one will be worse. Oh well, no use crying over spilt milk. Just enjoy the story.

* * *

Chapter 1

It's all start with meeting between a man and a woman.

The woman was a nurse in local hospital. The man was her amnesiac patient who's trying to remember who he was. They meet, they do things together, they fell in love, they married with a child. Florence Nightingale Effect in full blast.

It was simple, run-off-the-mill love story. A happy family with happy ending.

Except it was not.

The woman was a Magus—a certain race of human who possess ability to cast a type of magic called Magecraft using Special Pseudo-Nerves called Magic Circuit within their soul that produced and can regulates magic energy. The power, the circuits, are passed down from parent to child. The woman inherit it from her mother who was a lovers of a Magus and happens to possess some Circuit, albeit could be count with one hand. It was only given that her son does possess Magic Circuits like herself.

The Grandmother only know bare bones of Magecraft, told by her lover.

The Mother only know what her mother taught her. Once visited the Magecraft Institution out of curiousity but grow disgusted with how things worked there. Swore to never visited the place even if the world ends.

The child, the Son, on other hand, was drawn strongly to Magecraft like moth to flame. Have been showing signs of Magus-like ability and activating his circuits since he was a kid. His desire to studied more about Magecraft burn strongly in his heart and mind.

The Son and the Mother would often clashed about the Son's desire to visit the Magecraft Institution and learn about magic. The Mother would always call it foolish and tried to made him forget about it. Ultimately, once she and her husband die, the boy would sold their family fortunes to paid tuition to the institution.

"...You said it starts with a woman meet a man."

That's right.

We never know the man's opinion about it, right? Or his background for any matter?

The Man never knew his wife and his son are Magi. They thought he was a normal human and exclude him from any magecraft-related talks. Keep him out of loop.

Except the man _did_ know about Magic and Magecraft, have been studied it before. However, those knowledge was lost alongside with the rest of his memories pre-meeting the Woman, as is his knowledge of what he actually is.

...hey. When did I said he was ever a human? It was the Woman and the Son who _assume_ he was normal human in the first place.

Even though the memory are lost, the Man's innate talent in Magecraft does not. His Sorcery Trait is very much alive and passed down to his son alongside with his inhuman blood. The Man did not remember it, but the family he hailed from has clauses for this. A drastic measure that was painful but very much needed to preserve masquerade as long as possible. It also leave some... interesting souvenir.

~X~

_Belial (Hebrew: _בְּלִיַעַל _) (also Belhor, Baalial, Beliar, Beliall, Beliel, Beliya'al) is a term occurring in the Hebrew Bible which later became personified as the devil in Jewish and Christian texts._

_Belial (_בְלִיַּעַל _bĕli-yaal) is a Hebrew word "used to characterize the wicked or worthless." The etymology of the word is often understood as "lacking worth", from two common words: beli- (_בְּלִי _"without-") and ya'al ( _יָעַל _"to be of value")._

A teenager with straight bob-cut hair paused in his reading, blinked once, before continue.

_Some scholars translate it from Hebrew as "worthless" (Beli yo'il), while others translate it as "yokeless" (Beli ol), "may he have no rising" or "never to rise" (Beli ya'al). Only a few etymologists have believed it to be an invented name from the start._

_The word occurs twenty-seven times in the Masoretic Text, in verses such as Proverbs 6:12, where the King James Version (KJV) translates the Hebrew phrase adam beli-yaal as "a naughty person"._

_In the Hebrew text the phrase is either "sons of Belial" or simply "sons of worthlessness"._

A quiet chuckle escaped his lips.

"...why do I draw parallel between me and this guy? Oh right. _Worthlessness_." He spat the last word as if it was a curse. In some way, he did view it as curse.

His name is Waver Velvet, a First-Gen Magus and student at Eulyphis Department, the Spiritual Evocation Department. Right now he was rectify his mistake at jumping straight to Eulyphis which caught his fancy without enrolling to Fundamentals first. Ahh, curse his shortsightedness! It's like jumping at college level mathematics without mastering the basic adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing! Stupid stupid stupid!

Well, in hindsight he only had handfuls things to be sold. In fact what's left of his inheritance was the house's deed and the house itself, and bare bones of furniture. What's worth of money and not overly important to him, he sold. But that barely covered the tuition and now he's in really tight money.

So, yes, he jumped straight to one of "Advance" levels without mastering basic because he only had so much resources. And it bites him back in the ass. Hard.

Damn it. Stupid bureaucracy.

At least the Library is for public and he can just borrow books from there for free as long as he returned it in pristine condition _**or else**_.

Yawning, Waver rubbed his eyes and looked at his alarm clock. Ugh... three in the mornings already? Had he been too engrossed in researching that he forgot to sleep? But there's some books left. He had to cram those before heading to the bed, lest that jerk teacher publicly humiliated him. Again. For the nth time.

Just as he about to stood up and get himself some hot tea, a wave of nausea hit him. Following soon was the soaring heat send coursing through his entire body. Start from his spine to all of his nerves. Then his lungs start screaming and Waver began coughing blood.

"D-dammit... not again." Wheezing pathetically, Waver forced his strained-and-very-much-in-pain body to crawl back to his bed, in which he quickly thrown the blanket over his body.

Just right in time before his senses began malfunctioned. First was his senses of [Taste]. He can't taste the blood that surely pooling inside his mouth anymore. Following is [Smell]. The distinct parchment and leather bound book and the scent of usual detergent he'd use was no longer here. Next is [Hear]. Waver doesn't know if he was screaming or not, and if he does, he doesn't know how loud it was. The small mercy is the Silencing Runes he paid a former roomates of his is still working. Then [Sight], as his world fade to endless black that sadly had been familiar sight for him yet still maddening. Finally he lost sense of [Touch].

Gone was the blanket that probably strangle him. Gone was the bed. All Waver can felt is sense of failing into literal black hole. No sight, no sounds, nothing to touch or to feel. Only insane pain that droves him mad and threatening to turn him from mush, start from his insides.

Once in a while, Waver would've had his body in this condition. His body would take roller coaster to World of Pain and all five senses were lost, accompanied with his circuits would activate and goes out of control. Leaving him writhing in agony and helpless. Every time it happens, it would be worse than before. Sometimes Waver think he would die from the pain alone. Luckily it would pass sooner or later, depends on conditions such as his health.

He originally think it was a curse, but the theory is dismissed because two reasons.

First, he had it since he was thirteen. Two years before he attends Clock Tower. It was weak, back then. Only zoning out or losing consciousness for five minutes, tops. He was sure no one cursed him because, why bother? Curse a first gen who not even attends Clock Tower and not break Statue of Secrecy was a waste of time and resource.

Second, every time it ends, and Waver no longer felt like he had gone through a blender with water straight from Antarctica, he felt _better_ than pre-BlackOut. It was small thing. Little increase in stamina, endurance, and/or agility. Better understanding of magecraft, and better aptitude to language lessons.

As if it was compensating for the pain.

If he can felt his body, and it won't screaming in pain at him, Waver would've run his fingers through his hair. Exasperated and more than little baffled.

It was weird. Honest.

~X~

Because Waver now was trapped in his personal Black Hole dimension, he didn't realize that someone had taken accord of his condition and decide to visits him. Perhaps it was good thing that despite his eyes were peeled open, he did not, cannot, see anything. Otherwise he would've screamed in fright rather than pain, and wet himself out of fear.

"Oh Dear. This version of Waver can rivaled a banshee in screaming departments." Kischur Zelretch Scweinorg grumbles as he fished out pair of earmuff from his Pocket dimension and put it over his ears. Silly they might look like, they were top notch earmuff. The screaming now no longer reached his sensitive ears. "Alright. Hearing, secured. Now, what's made you like this, boy? I don't remember any of your incarnations have something like this. Not even your female alternates who had nasty Time of the Month."

Preening in, Zelretch put a hand on Waver's chest and use some prana to use scanning Magecraft and see what the problem—

"Hm? What is this?"

There's some... oddities to Waver's Circuits. They were being bound by a powerful magecraft. It supposed to be delicate, but the process was sloppy as if done by amateur. If he had to compare, it was like put a wild animal in cage that was too small for its size. The animal of course refused to be bound like this and clawed its way to freedom. In this case, Waver's Circuits was the animal and the binds were the cage.

Weird.

Waver's circuits are normal for first-gen Magus. Why would someone bothers to bind them? That made no sense unless...

Oh! So that's it! This version of Waver was unlike his other incarnations! He is special! Who knows this Waver is not exactly mere first-gen. His heritage was fighting against the loose bind and come close to being unbound. It was only matters of time right now. And when _that_ happens, the real problem will arise.

That won't do. Waver is interesting, in all of his incarnations, just like Emiya Shirou. Zelretch can honestly say he likes Waver. His biting tongue and his reactions is always amusing. And he was one of rare people who could speak to Zelretch without currying favor or be sly. Letting him get Sealing Designation was a no-no. What to do... what to do...

Oh yeah. His old friend was still confined to his room, bored out of his mind because the Bureaucracy and Trip-or-be-tripped nature of this place unchanged for over thousand years. Perhaps he would be interested in taking in an apprentice. This version of Waver is close to him in term of origin. Yup.

Grinning, Zelretch went to the desk and start writing a letter in an empty paper. Waver won't be able to read it right now, but once he's better, he will. Just to made sure the boy will find the letter and read it, Zelretch add tiny compulsion spell.

His job here is done, now time to tell old friend.

Things are soooo going to be interesting. He can't wait for when the chaos happens.

On the bed, even as he was unconscious and trapped in personal mental prison, Waver feel headaches and chaos heading his way and shuddered.

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Waver wake up after what-seemingly-felt-like-eternity-but-actually-only-two-days had passed. In his agony-induced-sleep, he somehow get himself tangled within blanket and sheet, and only his face was free. As a result, he now looks like a demented crossbreed between a mummy and a caterpillar.

/THUD/

And he fell off the bed while attempting to untangle himself.

"That shitty—"

It took him hours of wriggling and doing anything he could before finally successfully untangle himself out of that thrice-damned fabric. Of course he was cursing the whole time.

Sighing, Waver stood up and put hands on his hip. "Gre..t... I... run... detergent." He mumbled with hoarse voice as he stared irritatingly at the dried blood stains.

His body felt like jell-o and he want nothing but rest right away even though all he did was laying in his bed, screaming, and got himself tangle up it was miracle he didn't strangle himself by accident. His stomatch felt empty. He was hungry enough he felt like he can eat whole cow by himself, and his throat was hoarse he barely able to make decent sentence.

And a letter sitting innocently on his desk—wait, _what?_

Blinked, Waver reached for the letter. Hm? He didn't remember write one, or receive one in this week. He's sure nobody entered the dorm room while he... isolated himself due the screaming and tossing around. Perhaps someone send it when he was unavaiable? Pity the eardrums then... unless it was a familiar? But who would send him a letter? Not his mentor, that to be sure. That man could care less if he dropped dead suddenly.

Curiosity peaked, Waver reach out for the letter and read it. Wide grin slowly broke out in his face as he read further.

_To Waver Velvet,_

_You have... an interesting "knack" for Magecraft, and thus have potential. Such latent talent if let un nurtured would be a waste. Therefore I assigned you a suitable mentor for your talent._

_You may find him in Room XXX, Floor XX, Clock Tower Main Administrative Building, British Museum, London. Feel free to seek him at any given time, considering your unusual... situations, however I recommended you to knock in certain pattern._

_Sign_

There's no signagture, or stamp, but it looks genuine. And whether it was official or not, Waver was too happy to cares for such a thing.

"Finally!" He shouted in joy. "Someone recognie my awesomeness! And you said I have no talent? Ha! Eat your words, Kayneth Archie-Baldy! Hahahahaha-*cough**cough*cough*!" Waver winced at his throat. Oh right. Water first, laugh later.

Wait. No. Water, bath, dress up, get some sandwich, and get to the meeting place. First impression is all and he can't allow himself to be tardy! He had an appointment / interview to attend. If he detain it even more than it already was, what respect he might've earned would be chuckled out of window.

Seriously, some magi are more temperamental and whimsical than five year old spoiled brats. Granted they have something to back that attitude but... sigh.

How envious to be them. Can do what they want because they have money and connection. Ugh! Just you guys wait! Waver will show them, that even someone like him can outshine them if he tried hard! He will made sure of it!

~X~

This floor is lined up with High Class Mystic Code short of from Ages of God and other stuff Waver don't dare to touch because even if he were to sell his organs, he still can't paid the debt. He have to literally sell his soul to the devil itself to even made dent in the debt!

"Room XXX... Room XXX... where was it?"

Walking almost in haste at Clock Tower main building and the most exclusive floor... Waver can only dream of it seeing only the high class Magi can use this floor. Others have to be personally invited. Not even the Lords in Clock Tower can access this floor as they pleased. As far as he knew, only someone on par of Head of Fraction such as Bartholomeloi that ever use this floor.

And his soon to be Mentor is set meeting on this floor?!

He have to stop and do his best to contain his giddiness. Oh, Kayneth would turn green in envy if he knew. Waver would rub this on his face... once he was strong enough to do that without ended up as red stain on the floor.

"Room XXX... Oh! There is it!"

The door was made from the best of wood, polished to this level of perfection. Waver raise his knuckles and knocks the door in certain pattern written at corner of the letter.

He waited with heart beating fast.

Who is his mentor? Does he know them? Are they important perso—well duh! They can access this floor so they sure as hell is important and rank really high! The question is how high? And how their personality is? Nice? Bad? No, that's wrong question. Let him rephrase it. Was his mentor is stern person, or refer hands-off approach? Practice or theory? Sadistic? Lunatic? Or perhaps troll like certain Wizard Marshall everyone include Waver treated as boogieman's boogieman?

"Enter!"

Gulping, Waver turned in the doorknob and nervously enter.

The insides are no better than the outsides. Old, thick books that could make even Lords itching to get their hands on them lined in antique shelves that had protective runes drawn on them. The furniture are far than the outside, but each of them has their function. In fact, the fewer furniture and alarm means they could serve to their maximum potential rather than overlapping with each other and result in backfiring at worst possible time. For example, the painting of scenery there. At first glance, it was normal painting with little to no value, but if Waver squinted his eyes he can see runes and other old scribes formed the picture, basically declaring it as powerful mystic code with how rich the history those scribes contains.

The man who sat behind the desk, too, is no slouch either.

Clad in modern aristocratic look like the Twelve Lords, his mere presense was brimming with power. He may look like normal person, yet she was anything but normal. The verdant green eyes seemed to pierce through Waver's Soul, dissecting him bit by bit, weighing his soul against a scale. The silver hair give way for even more inhumane presence. Like he was no human but something more. Something close to magic. Practically breathe in it. And the shadows...

"P-P-Pha-Phantasmal...?!"

The shadow of that person... either it was due the lightning in this room, the chair, or other factors... made it looks like she has a pair of wings grow from his back. The fact the man had large painting of a devil holding chain over people souls and some beast behind his doesn't helped the image.

The man smiled. "Sit down." He said.

Like a puppet with its string pulled, Waver's body moved without his permission. His movement was stiff and no grace at all. Like a prisoner waiting for the guillotine to dropped and beheaded him.

"Oh, calm down. It's not like I'm going to kill you or anything."

/Snap!/

Like a breeze, the spell dismissed in an instant. The second Waver regained control over his body, he nearly toppled over, grasping for breath.

Since when he was under spell? How did he didn't notice it? The room was so silent he would've heard any movement, even rustling of clothes. And with how Prana seems to throbbing in this place, and spell being cast would be like an elephant in the room. That concludes the spell was being cast before he enter, and only affected when he perform certain action, as when he enter and looking around he was still under control over his own action but what—

Wait a minute.

"The painting behind you..." Waver gasped. "They are drawn using ancient scribes as foundation for the picture, wasn't it? Runes, Ancient Chinese scribes... then I believe that was kabbalah that formed the chain there... Arabic letters and Sanskrit also used to formed the human and the beast respectively. The shadow you cast was a catalyst to draw my attention to them, and thus cast the spell's effect on me." He deducted.

Waver blinked. Did he just... did he just said it out loud? Darn his impulses! He can't stop analyzing magic and picking them apart even if he want to! Kayneth had threatened to cut off his tongue if he can't control it.

But this man only smiled and clapper his hand.

"Brilliant. I guess it can't be helped as you has [Analyze] as Origin." He said. Voice cool as winter. "Indeed I do. As you realize everything in this room served double purpose. Decoration and security. Though this is the first time someone deducted them that fast." Smirk. "You were as interesting as Zelretch said. No wonder that old troll had paid attention to you."

If possible, Waver's face become even paler.

_ZELRETCH_ take notice of him?! On one hand, it means he truly had potential to be great Magus as anyone Zelretch had taken interest, must be exceptional person either in term of prowess, skill, or personality. On other hand, Zelretch is notorious troll that everybody on Clock Tower and Beyond feared, especially when he was feeling bored because no fucking one knew what he would do. And he notice Waver enough to recommended him a mentor.

So yeah... Waver has mixed feeling at how to react regarding this information.

He decided to go with what he thought was safest route.

"U-umm... so... you are my mentor?"

"Correct." The man nodded. "But don't take yourself so highly. You may be interesting case, but I take you in because Zelretch recommends you and I have nothing better to do with my lax timetables. Otherwise I won't bothered with all political squabbles and Magi debates that, frankly, while amusing to watch, was nothing bore but glorified childish squabbles and waste of time."

Waver... felt like someone punch him in the gut. His pride was taking massive hit.

O U C H.

"However, since I already agree to this, might as well making it worth my time. Don't disappoint me."

"Y-Yes Sir!"

"Good." The man nodded. "Now tell me about your ability."

"Huh?"

"How am I suppose to works out with you unless I know what you good at and what you bad at? Last thing I want is to get some cleaning utensils and wipe what remains of you because you got the wrong spell or ritual to learn."

Oh. That made sense. No wonder he barely learn anything unless he do research himself. What was taught at at class, if ever, was stuff that everyone already knew about and at some cases, has no relation to personal skill. They had to do individual research and experimenting.

"Well... I am New Blood... in fact I am the third generation of my family," uh? Why is this guy snorted? Did Waver say something funny? Hopefully not about how shallow his family history was. "I had ten paltry circuits on weak Quality... and as you said, I had [Analyze] as Origin. My strongest stuff is observation and analyzing. I'm weak at..." here, Waver paused and ashamedly continued, "Well... anything more advance than basic."

The man tapped his chin. "That was... problematic case." Waver winced at that.

Yeah. He barely had trait of a good Magus. In fact it was a miracle he even had aptitude in the first place! But he has big dreams and he gonna see it comes true, even if he need decades to achieve that.

He heard Valueyeta lead Democracy Faction that takes all talents, even from new blood. If he stood out enough he might be able to joined them.

"So, what did you try?"

"Umm... reading a lot of book and try simplest spell of each. I don't know what I'm good at so I have to do lots of Trial and Error."

The man nodded, then smirked. "How about this? Say, if a spell or ritual is a puzzle, it means you were struggling to put them together, right? Always mistook one part with another, and ended up making things worse, right?"

"That or I had not enough prana to pull that off." Waver sighed dejectedly.

The shame of being born in infantile Magus Family.

"Then we will try it differently." Different, how? "Rather than put together a spell or a ritual, I want you to observe already-cast spell or ritual, and _picks them apart."_

"W-what?"

"You heard me. I want you to analyze a spell or ritual and pick them apart. What they did, where did they originates, the components and elements, how vital they were, the side-effect if exist. I want you to dissect them apart, like unfolds a mystery. Do you think you able to?"

Waver gulped. "W-with my Origin... I think there's a possibility but... why?"

Why, indeed!

The man's smirk was as if he was hiding a joke, or good stuff... for him, not so for Waver. "Just do it. If you can't do it from front to back, then let's try the reverse. Who knows after you understood it to personal level, you might be able to figure the most efficient way to cast it."

Ohh... that's... makes sense. Like a phrase "There's Many Ways Lead to Rome", if one method won't work no matter how you try it, then you don't force yourself. You find another method, or another perspective, that will work.

"I undersood." Waver nodded and pulled out a notebook and a fountain pen. "Where should I start?"

"Why don't you try to analyze this?" The man take something from the drawer. It was a locket... with yet another scribes make form of snake as decoration.

Letter Magecraft, huh? Waver should've know. The furniture here... basically covered in letters from various language—was that hieroglyph there?! How did that even fit?

Still, one thing.

"I never caught your name." Waver admitted.

"That's because I never gave it yet." The man replied. "Argento Ronove. Though you won't find anyone who know it, as whenever I appears, I would be under title The Scribe."

Waver never heard of him before! Heck, he rarely heard a thing about The Scribe he said he known as. But... there's no doubt Mr. Ronove was a High Class Magus, to know Zelretch on personal level, and able to use this floor.

...why did he has a Demon as surname, though. Eh, what the hell? Who cares. Not his problem. After all there's a lecturer whose surname is Flauros.

TBC


End file.
